Special Session to Include TransCanada Buyout

Gov. Bill Walker’s proposal to increase the state’s share in the Alaska LNG Project could put Alaska on the hook for more than $14 billion, but also generate about $400 million in additional annual revenue, according to a report from Department of Natural Resources consultants.

The report released Sept. 30 performed by Black and Veatch, a consulting company that has evaluated the Alaska LNG Project in the past, firmed up an earlier estimate that the near-term cost for the state to buy out TransCanada Corp. would be $108 million.

Alaska would then be on the hook, however, for TransCanada’s 25 percent portion of financing the North Slope gas treatment plant and the 800-mile pipeline south to Nikiski.

The $400 million in annual cash flow increase — in 2015 dollars — by terminating TransCanada’s role, would come from not paying the company’s tariffs on the state’s gas through the North Slope plant and the pipeline.

Buying out TransCanada is an agenda item for the special legislative session Walker called to start Oct. 24 in Juneau.